Baby Buzzard (oz6367)

About this Plan

Baby Buzzard. Radio control sport model. Scaled down old-timer design.

Quote: "RCM's Dick Kidd tried out Art Hemler's prototype of this scaled down old-timer and found out you can get twenty minute flights on two ounces of fuel. Baby Buzzard, by Art Hemler.

How do you convert a glider guy to flying power? It's easy! Just get RCM's Bill O'Brien to let him fly his Buzzard Bombshell (oz5360). That's what happened to this hard-nosed glider jockey, who wouldn't be caught dead near one of those oil chuckers. I was at least enjoying some of the feeling of free flight with my gliders, even if I did resort to the terrible sin of radio to bring it home again. But an engine - ugh!

After handing back the transmitter, fact is, I could hardly wait to get my hands on the February 1973 issue of RCM and reread Bob Harrah's article on the Bombshell and its history. After acquiring a set of plans, I proceeded to build my own. Talk about flying for fun! I'd spend all day Sunday flying and come home dead tired (that good kind of tired you get after flying all day). Twenty minutes of flying from a two ounce tank and an OS Max .35 is nothing to sneeze at these days! The Buzzard cruises at 1/8 throttle. You only open it to climb. Operating expense is at a minimum.

Well, somehow I acquired an Enya .09. RC engine. What to do with it? Why not scale down the Bombshell to accept it? Two thirds scale should be about right, giving me about a 48 in span. Why, I could haul that in the VW.

The prototype came out quite tail heavy due to careless use of the wrong weight balsa in the wrong places. The required weight necessary to balance the airplane seemed wasteful to me. It was flown anyway, with a 2 oz tank, Kraft two channel brick and the throttle wired open. I thought that 2 oz tank would never run out! For six minutes it was nothing but up, circling ever upward. From now on I would only use half a tank.

Then came the glide, and what a glide! Just like her big sister. In fact, it was just like the Amigo (oz4428), and that Amigo had a glide. Heavy or not, it took fifteen minutes to touchdown and I know I rushed it in the nervousness of that first flight. (Even now the glider guys ask me to go up and find out where the thermals are.)

Two more Baby's were constructed with careful consideration to keeping the tail light. An OS Max .15 was used but this time with throttle servo. Now I could fly as low and as slow as I ever cared to with the niceties of the most completely docile airplane available. I could taxi back to the flight line, forget about that walk back to the Hi-Start, and enjoy the same pleasure that I had received from soaring.

The comments and questions that I receive at the field indicate that all modelers are starting to feel the pinch of the energy crisis. Some supplies are getting harder to buy, spruce and balsa, for example. Others are beginning to cost more. So why not start thinking smaller, building smaller? The Baby Buzzard is one way to go with-out sacrificing excellent flying quality. You probably have enough in your scrap box to carry a long way into the construction of the Baby.

Fuselage. Sides are cut from medium weight 3/32 sheet balsa making certain that both are of equal hardness and bendability. Mark the locations of the bulkheads on the inboard sides and cement 1/8 square uprights into place. Cut and install 1/8 hard balsa doublers at the forward end with 5 minute epoxy (white glue would warp here). Make bulkheads F1 through F3 of 1/8 ply. Cement plywood doublers to F2 and F3 (epoxy). Drill 1/16 holes for landing gear lacing at this time. Locate. and install the engine mount blind nuts in F1 and an extra blind nut somewhat lower for balancing weight later..."

Update 01/04/2015: Replaced this plan with a clearer copy, thanks to Balsaworkbench and theshadow.

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